What's Up Now With Que Pasa, Usa?

After 25 Years, The Beloved Pbs Sitcom Is Still A Favorite Of Fans Worldwide.

August 7, 2005|By Madeline BarM-s Diaz Miami Bureau

For more than 25 years, the sitcom M-?QuM-i Pasa, USA? has kept people all over the world laughing at the exploits of a 1970s-era Cuban-American family straddling two cultures in Little Havana.

Since the bilingual show ended its 39-episode run in 1980, it has rarely been off the air, making its way around the world in reruns.

"It was a special program for a special time for South Florida history and American television history," said David Mullins, vice-president of marketing for WPBT-Ch.2, the Miami public television station that had the show during its original run. "What was funny 20 years ago is still funny today if it was well done."

The show will be one of the highlights of WPBT's 50th anniversary celebration, The Golden Years: Channel 2's 50th Anniversary Special, scheduled to air at 9 p.m. Friday, and clips of the show will air occasionally as part of the commemoration this month.

Although the show has been on DVD for two years, available through the WPBT-affiliated site quepasausa.org, the station has only sold about 1,000 copies of the five-disc collection. Many of those sales have been through word of mouth, Mullins said.

"We haven't done as much promotion outside of our own broadcasts, just because of the expense involved," he said. "In the non-commercial arena, which we are with public television, 1,000 copies is a relative success."

M-?QuM-i Pasa, USA?, which centered on the extended PeM-qa family, began as a grant proposal put together by now-retired Miami-Dade College professor Manny Mendoza.

At the time, the federal government was giving out grants for television programs about minority groups. Shortly before meeting with a U.S. Department of Education official in Washington, D.C., Mendoza came up with the format, a situation comedy.

"My favorite show on TV at the time was All in the Family," Mendoza recalled. "I thought it would be a sitcom with a social message."

A culture clash

At the time, the children of Cuban immigrants were caught between cultures, Mendoza said. At home, their families expected them to speak Spanish and embrace Cuban culture, while at school, teachers encouraged them to speak English and act "American," he said. They also had generational misunderstandings with their elders.

From that premise, Mendoza outlined the PeM-qa clan -- father Pepe, mother Juana, teenage children Joe and Carmen and grandparents Antonio and Adela.

"We said we wanted to do a three-generation Cuban family living in Little Havana with two teenaged children," he said. "The grandparents never learned any English, so they remained Cuban, but pre-1959 Cubans. The parents were supposed to be around 40 and spoke English with a heavy accent."

Once the project was approved, Mendoza brought executive producer Pepe Bahamonde onboard, along with writer Luis Santeiro. Both were young Cuban-Americans who understood the culture, Mendoza said.

"They could relate to all the generations," he said.

They cast the show with actors who, for the most part, were known in the Cuban-American community, and made a pilot in 1976. Joe, the studly older brother, was portrayed by college student Rocky EchevarrM-ma. Years later, EchevarrM-ma changed his name and made a movie career as Steven Bauer. Another future movie star, Andres "Andy" Garcia, also had guest roles on the show.

"The first year we had $250,000 and had to do 10 shows," Mendoza said. "Back then, on network TV, you almost couldn't do one episode for $250,000. I couldn't believe the talent that we had."

Uniquely Cuban

In May 1977, the show went on the air in Miami; two months later it was shown in Tampa. In the fall of 1977, it was tested in Washington, D.C., and Chicago, and went national in January 1978, Mendoza said. At one point, it was broadcast in more than 140 cities, he said.

The situations seemed unique to the Cuban community -- episodes touched on topics such as the Afro-Cuban religion of Santeria, the (embarrassing) tradition of chaperoned dates for teenage girls, and velorios, or wakes. The show's clever mangling of English and Spanish burned words like "coolisimo" into the vocabulary of die-hard fans.

Still, the show touched a chord with people everywhere. That's because it was about the immigrant experience, Mendoza said.

"You have to understand that America is a nation of immigrants," he said. "A lot of different immigrant groups could relate with what they were going through. We had a 76-year-old Jewish man from Miami Beach who would call us every week to tell us it was the best show on television."

Responses began to pour in from other countries as well.

"I was getting fan mail from Venezuela and places like that," Mendoza said. "It wasn't even supposed to be seen over there. People were pirating it. ... It showed in places that you wouldn't believe."

Then the U.S. government cut off funding for ongoing television programs, and with no alternate sources of money the show went off the air in 1980.